5.  The applicant was born in 1953 and lives in Zubry village, Pustomytivsky District, Lvivska Region.
6.  On 11 May 1992 the Pustomytivsky District Council (hereafter “the District Council”) withheld from “L.”, an agricultural company, a plot of land to transfer it to individual farmers for permanent use (hereafter “the 1992 decision”). A four-hectare part of this plot in the administrative ownership of Zubry village was allocated to the applicant.
7.  On 27 April 1993 the applicant was issued with a Land Use Act (Державний акт на право користування землею) in his name as a physical person registering his permanent right to use this plot for farming.
8.  On an unspecified date the applicant complained to the Lviv Regional Arbitration Court that the Zubry Village Council (hereafter “the Village Council”) had refused to allocate to his farm in kind the plot of land to which he had been entitled under the Land Use Act.
9.  On 10 March 1994 the above court ordered the Village Council to allocate the plot to the applicant’s farm by 10 April 1994.
10.  This judgment (hereafter “the 1994 court judgment”), which was rectified in 1996, became final and enforcement proceedings were instituted in its respect. On numerous occasions the bailiffs approached the Village Council seeking allocation of the plot. However, the latter refused, insisting that the community had no land for distribution and that all available plots were lawfully occupied by other parties.
11.  On 4 October 2000 the Village Council took an official decision refusing to allocate the land to the applicant’s farm, stating that there were no available plots.
12.  On 1 March 2001 the Lviv Regional Arbitration Court revoked this decision as unlawful, finding that the previous judgment confirming the applicant’s farm’s right to a plot of land had never been challenged in accordance with applicable procedures and so had remained in force and subject to execution.
13.  On an unspecified date the bailiffs destroyed the enforcement order and discontinued the enforcement proceedings.
14.  On 6 March 2008 the applicant, acting on behalf of his farm, instituted proceedings against the bailiffs, complaining about their failure to ensure enforcement of the 1994 court judgment and seeking a renewal of the enforcement proceedings.
15.  On 27 May 2008 the Lviv Regional Commercial (former Arbitration) Court allowed his claim in part. It noted that the 1994 court judgment had never been revoked and remained in force at the material time. It further found that the failure of the bailiffs to enforce the judgment at issue and destruction of the enforcement order issued by the court was not lawful.
16.  On 9 March 2010 the Lviv Commercial Court of Appeal upheld this decision, having added to its operational part that the applicant’s demand for reopening of the enforcement proceedings should be rejected.
17.  The parties did not inform the Court as to whether there had been any further appeals against this decision.
18.  On 25 November 1998 the Pustomytivsky District Prosecutor lodged a protest against the 1992 decision allocating the land to the applicant.
19.  On 4 December 1998 the District Council revoked the decision at issue following this intervention and requested the prosecutor to initiate proceedings for revocation of the applicant’s Land Use Act and registration as a farmer. The Council noted, in particular, that the land at issue should have been distributed among the employees of “L.”, which the applicant was not. It also noted that the plot had been allocated to the applicant without a proper preliminary land survey and before he had been duly registered as a farmer.
20.  The applicant appealed against this decision before the Lviv Regional Arbitration Court.
21.  On 4 February 1999 the court ruled for the applicant. It found that the District Council had no authority to interfere with the applicant’s use of the land, unless this use were found to be unlawful according to the procedure established by section 49 of the Property Act. It further noted that the reasons cited by the Council in justification of the revocation of the decision did not constitute a valid ground for divesting him of the possession of the plot. According to the case file materials this decision was not appealed against and became final.
22.  On 14 June 1999 the President of the Lviv Regional Arbitration Court reviewed the decision by way of supervisory review following the defendant’s request and found the previous decision lawful.
23.  On 1 December 1999 the Higher Arbitration Court revoked these decisions and remitted the case for fresh consideration.
24.  On 20 April 2000 the Lviv Regional Arbitration Court found that the defendant had acted contrary to section 59 of the Self-Governance Act in revoking its 1992 decision and found that revocation unlawful. It appears from the case file materials that this decision was not appealed against and became final.
25.  On 12 July 2000 the Deputy President of the Lviv Regional Arbitration Court reviewed the decision by way of supervisory review at the defendant’s request and upheld the previous decision.
26.  On an unspecified date the above decisions were revoked and the proceedings reopened.
27.  On 19 December 2002 the Lviv Regional Commercial (former Arbitration) Court rejected the applicant’s claim. It noted that on 28 January 1992 the Pustomytivsky District Council had decided that the land withheld from “L.” for distribution to individual farmers would be allocated to its (former) employees in accordance with Article 7 of the Farming Act and Article 5 of the Land Code in force at the material time. As the applicant had not been employed by “L.”, he had not been eligible to obtain a plot from the land at issue. The court further noted that the extra-judicial procedure by which the Council’s decision had been revoked was lawful, as the Prosecutors’ Office Act entitled prosecutors to lodge objections to unlawful decisions of various entities, obliging them to review them and remove their shortcomings where necessary. As regards the Council’s request for the prosecutor to initiate proceedings for revocation of the Land Use Act and the applicant’s registration as a farmer, these were recommendations only and did not as such have any bearing on the applicant’s rights. On 15 May 2003 the Lviv Regional Commercial Court of Appeal upheld this decision.
28.  The applicant appealed in cassation, alleging that revocation of the decision of 11 May 1992 was contrary to the applicable provisions of substantive and procedural law. In particular, this revocation had resulted in the applicant’s being de facto deprived of a plot of land on grounds not foreseen in the applicable legislation and in violation of due process provisions, requiring judicial proceedings for a decision on that deprivation.
29.  On 14 January 2004 the Higher Commercial Court upheld the previous judgments, noting that the applicant had never submitted a proper application for allocation of the land and that as he had never worked for “L.” there had been no grounds to add him to the list of persons entitled to obtain its former land in the first place. In the light of the above there was no reason to conclude either that the prosecutor had wrongfully objected to the 1992 decision or that the District Council had wrongfully revoked it in response to this objection.
30.  On 15 April 2004 the Supreme Court of Ukraine refused the applicant leave to make a further appeal in cassation.
31.  Subsequently the applicant attempted unsuccessfully to have the proceedings reopened and the judgment of 19 December 2002 reviewed.
32.  It is not clear from the case file materials whether the validity of the applicant’s Land Use Act was ever reviewed by the domestic judicial authorities.